{"id":377357,"date":"2010-03-01T11:29:24","date_gmt":"2010-03-01T16:29:24","guid":{"rendered":"tag:www.southernstudies.org,2010:\/\/5.12162"},"modified":"2010-03-08T09:32:07","modified_gmt":"2010-03-08T14:32:07","slug":"census-watch-in-louisiana-the-census-gets-a-dose-of-cajun-pride","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/377357","title":{"rendered":"CENSUS WATCH: In Louisiana, the Census gets a dose of Cajun pride"},"content":{"rendered":"<p>        <span class=\"mt-enclosure mt-enclosure-image\" style=\"display: inline;\"><a href=\"http:\/\/www.southernstudies.org\/images\/sitepieces\/cajun_census_map_2000.png\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" alt=\"cajun_census_map_2000.png\" src=\"http:\/\/www.southernstudies.org\/assets_c\/2010\/03\/cajun_census_map_2000-thumb-250x181.png\" class=\"mt-image-right\" style=\"margin: 0pt 0pt 20px 20px; float: right;\" height=\"181\" width=\"250\" \/><\/a><\/span>There&#8217;s an effort underway in Louisiana to use the 2010 Census to pull in federal funding for Cajun and Creole cultural programs, and it&#8217;s stirring up some controversy over how to best classify members of the state&#8217;s French-speaking cultures.<\/p>\n<p><a class=\"a2a_dd\" href=\"http:\/\/www.addtoany.com\/share_save?linkname=&amp;linkurl=http%3A%2F%2Fwww.southernstudies.org%2F2010%2F03%2Fcensus-watch-in-louisiana-the-census-gets-a-dose-of-cajun-pride.html\"><img loading=\"lazy\" decoding=\"async\" src=\"http:\/\/static.addtoany.com\/buttons\/share_save_171_16.png\" width=\"171\" height=\"16\" border=\"0\" alt=\"Share\/Bookmark\"\/><\/a><script type=\"text\/javascript\">a2a_linkurl=\"http:\/\/www.southernstudies.org\/2010\/03\/census-watch-in-louisiana-the-census-gets-a-dose-of-cajun-pride.html\";<\/script><script type=\"text\/javascript\" src=\"http:\/\/static.addtoany.com\/menu\/page.js\"><\/script><\/p>\n<p>Question No. 8 on the Census short form asks whether someone is of &#8220;Hispanic, Latino, or Spanish origin&#8221; &#8212; and that has inspired action by the <a href=\"http:\/\/worldstudiesinstitute.org\/\">World Studies Institute of Louisiana<\/a>, a nonprofit based in Lafayette, La. that seeks to connect the state&#8217;s French speakers with the wider French-speaking world.<\/p>\n<p>The Independent Weekly of Lafayette <a href=\"http:\/\/www.theind.com\/news\/5681-cajuns-and-creoles-stand-up-state-has-golden-opportunity-with-census\">reports<\/a>:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>The WSI is urging the state&#8217;s Creole and Cajun communities to check the last box in No. 8 &#8212; &#8220;Yes. Another Hispanic, Latino or Spanish origin&#8221; &#8212; and then to write beneath it either &#8220;Louisiana Creole&#8221; or &#8220;Cajun.&#8221; For the first time, this will allow Uncle Sam to get a head count of the state&#8217;s Cajun and Creole populations, provided those groups don&#8217;t skip over question No. 8.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>The WSI&#8217;s Christophe Landry calls this year&#8217;s Census &#8220;a window of opportunity&#8221; for Louisiana&#8217;s French-speaking communities. <\/p>\n<p>Kat Smith, a spokesperson for the Census Bureau&#8217;s Dallas field office, says Louisiana Creoles and Cajuns who write in their cultural identification in response to the question will be counted, according to the Independent Weekly:<\/p>\n<blockquote><p>&#8220;As long as they as a group or ethnicity or race decide that they want to make sure that their numbers are where they need to be &#8212; we do the same thing for tribes, American Indian tribes and things of that nature &#8212; they can make sure their numbers are counted as such by identifying themselves consistently by writing it a certain way,&#8221; says Smith.<\/p><\/blockquote>\n<p>However, Louisianans who want to identify as Creole need to be specific: If someone writes in response to the question &#8220;French Creole&#8221; or simply &#8220;Creole,&#8221; that could also mean Haitians or other groups. That&#8217;s why they&#8217;re being asked to write &#8220;Louisiana Creole&#8221; instead.<\/p>\n<p>Not everyone supports WSI&#8217;s effort, though. Columbia University graduate student and Louisiana native Gus Gravot has formed a Facebook group titled <a href=\"http:\/\/www.facebook.com\/search\/?q=gus+gravot&amp;init=quick#%21\/group.php?gid=10150107160935195&amp;ref=mf\">Louisiana Cajun &amp; Creole \u2260 Latino<\/a>, questioning what he calls the &#8220;misidentification&#8221; of those groups as Latino.<\/p>\n<p>Instead, he&#8217;s calling on Louisiana&#8217;s Cajuns and Creoles to write in their identity in the &#8220;other&#8221; space provided in Section 9 of the Census, which asks about race.<\/p>\n<p>But whichever side one comes down on, there&#8217;s a benefit to the controversy &#8212; and that&#8217;s increased public discussion and awareness of the Census, which helps drive decisions over the spending of billions of federal dollars. This is especially important in the South, where there&#8217;s a <a href=\"http:\/\/www.southernstudies.org\/2010\/02\/southern-states-most-at-risk-from-census-undercount.html\">history of undercounting<\/a>.<\/p>\n<p>To see a copy of the Census form, click <a href=\"http:\/\/2010.census.gov\/2010census\/how\/interactive-form.php\">here<\/a>. <\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"<p>There&#8217;s an effort underway in Louisiana to use the 2010 Census to pull in federal funding for Cajun and Creole cultural programs, and it&#8217;s stirring up some controversy over how to best classify members of the state&#8217;s French-speaking cultures. Question No. 8 on the Census short form asks whether someone is of &#8220;Hispanic, Latino, or [&hellip;]<\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":4085,"featured_media":0,"comment_status":"closed","ping_status":"closed","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[7],"tags":[],"class_list":["post-377357","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","hentry","category-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377357","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/4085"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=377357"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/377357\/revisions"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=377357"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=377357"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/mereja.media\/index\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=377357"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}